


Snow in July

by bearfeathers



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Capsicoul - Freeform, M/M, Paranormal AU, angel!Steve, exorcist!Phil
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-14
Updated: 2013-05-14
Packaged: 2017-12-11 20:31:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/802905
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bearfeathers/pseuds/bearfeathers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They have names, mortal names, in place for these situations. What was his again?<br/>“Steve Rogers,” he answers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Snow in July

**Author's Note:**

  * For [choriarty](https://archiveofourown.org/users/choriarty/gifts).



> Right, so I wrote this some time back as a birthday gift for my friend Cho. It's a pretty rough sketch and it jumps around a bit, but at the time, I wasn't looking to write a novel and just sort of focused on the important Steve and Phil bits. I may try to rework this in the future and clean it up a bit, but for now it's just another victim of my documents folder's spring cleaning.

It’s hot. His body must be alight with the flames of Hell for all this anguish, he thinks. But no, it can’t be Hell; such a place does not possess a soul who would run its hand through his hair with such tenderness. Now and again when he begins to resurface from fevered sleep, he feels something wet and cool pressed to his forehead, quenching the fire inside him to some degree. He hears voices also, different voices, but one is always constant. There is a kindness to it, a gentleness that leads him to believe that surely the owner of this voice must belong also to the sure set of hands he feels brushing through his hair in a comforting gesture.

He moves further towards wakefulness, though he doesn’t know how much time has passed, and becomes aware of his pains. His back is a map of agony, his side positively burning with it. He’s fearful to discover what sort of condition his left wing is in. Pain is as far as he gets in his struggle towards consciousness. In frustration, he sinks back into the safety of that dark unawareness, but the presence by his side does not seem to mind or to waver.

There is fire when he finally wakes. He sucks in a startled breath as he lies on his stomach, his blurry gaze detecting nothing but the lick of flames before his face. There is a hand on the back of his neck—one of those sure, gentle hands that he’s come to recognize—and a man crouching beside him. A mortal man. A priest. His grey-blue eyes are as kind as his words.

“You’re awake,” the man says.

He tries to speak, but his throat is dry and catches, sending him into a coughing fit. There’s a straw pressed to his lips and he drinks without question, glad for the cool water to relieve his thirst. He sighs softly when he’s drained the glass. The man is sitting patiently in a chair beside his bed—for he’s in a bed, he’s discovered. The fire he’d seen is merely from a fireplace; not the flames of eternal damnation.

“Do you feel up to talking or would you prefer to rest?” the man asks.

He contemplates this. Already he can feel the tug of sleep, but he wants answers. Curiosity wins out.

“I’d like to talk,” he says softly.

“Good,” the man answers with a nod, his hands clasped in his lap. “I’m Father Coulson. Could you tell me your name?”

He presses his lips together, but stops before the first consonant is so much as hum upon his lips. His real name. That’s to be kept secret. He’s not sure exactly where he is or why they haven’t found him yet, but he can’t forfeit his true name. They have names, mortal names, in place for these situations. What was his again?

“Steve Rogers,” he answers.

Coulson dips his head in a nod. “It’s nice to meet you, Steve. Do you remember any of what may have happened to cause your injuries?”

Again Steve pauses. How much should he divulge? What if this is a trick?

“If it helps, we’re already aware of what you are,” Coulson says with a half-smile. “The wings were a bit of a giveaway.”

“…right,” Steve answers slowly. Too badly injured to will them away, then. “You can see them.”

“Yes. One of them’s broken, in fact,” Coulson divulges. “Sister Hill splinted it, but it’s still got some time left yet to heal. As does the rest of you.”

“I… Thank you,” Steve says. It’s all he can think to say.

“There’s no need. It’s what we do,” Coulson informs him. He leans forward marginally in his seat. “I realize my question may have disturbed you. Of course, we would like to know whatever you’d like to tell us in order to help you, but you won’t be pressured for information. If you feel you’d rather not reveal anything about yourself in the time that you stay here, I’ll see to it that no one bothers you further.”

Steve isn’t sure why, but he feels he can trust the priest. He can feel the man’s grace—though only barely in his current state—and its purity reassures him. He nods slowly.

“I would appreciate that,” he says.

Coulson offers him another small smile. “All right. Seeing as it seems as though I’m about to lose you to sleep again, we’ll see about getting you something to eat when you wake up.”

Steve mumbles his thanks before he’s asleep once more.

* * *

Steve recuperates in leaps and bounds over the course of the next few days. Father Coulson is attentive and by his side whenever he can be, and when he can’t there are plenty of other friendly faces; Father Sitwell and Sister Hill being the most prominent. Even Monsignor Fury stops in occasionally. It’s from the one-eyed man that Steve learns the parish that has taken him in is not like the majority of most mortal parishes. They deal primarily with the control of the creatures most mortals believe to be fictional; the ghosts and ghouls and goblins, the things that go bump in the night. Each one of them is a highly trained exorcist. He hears mention of two people, Barton and Romanoff, but has yet to see them.

He knows this is a dying breed—the world cannot boast many true exorcists in this day and age. But the job still has to be done, regardless. And they do it well, from what he can tell.

It’s only three days after he’s properly woken that his injuries have healed, with the exception of his wing.

“Snow?” Steve murmurs, lifting his arms as Coulson removes his dressings.

“Yes. It snowed on the Fourth of July. That’s when we found you,” the priest explains. “That was ten days ago. It’s still snowing now, in fact.”

“That’s… not right,” Steve says with a frown.

“No. It’s not,” Coulson agrees. “But it’s happening all the same. There you go. Now… let’s see about that wing…”

Steve sits very still as the splint is removed. He’d been the one to say he’d felt as though it could be removed, that his expedited healing process had likely hurried along the mending of his wing as well. But wings were sensitive things. He wonders if the priest somehow already knows that, or if he really is just that careful with everything he does. Even the gentle skim of fingers over feathers makes him shiver.

“Well, it certainly looks much better, in any case,” Coulson says from behind him. “How does it feel?”

He rustles his wings experimentally, wincing slightly at the tug and pull in his left. “The splint isn’t needed… but it might be a little before I fly again.”

He sighs, running a hand through his hair.

“It’s much harder to heal when I’m down here,” he admits.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” Coulson inquires.

“No, no, you’ve done so much already,” Steve insists. “It’s just that… down here, being so far from home… the connection’s weaker the further away we are.”

Coulson nods knowingly.

“Like Wi-Fi.”

“What’s Wi-Fi?”

“…nevermind. I understand what you’re trying to say.”

Steve quirks an eyebrow, but lets the matter drop. It’s not important. He studies the man in front of him, watching as the priest clears away the medical supplies. It’s strange and uncomfortable to think that he knows so many things about the mortal when the reverse is not true. He knows that Phillip J. Coulson has not always been a priest. He knows also that he was discharged from the military following an injury in his youth and picked up by Monsignor Fury. He knows that this priest, this man of God, does not, in fact, believe in God—but he does believe in angels. He knows that Coulson does not pray, does not believe in the power of prayer, but that his sometimes wishful thinking has reached Steve under that guise regardless. Above all, he knows that Father Coulson is a good man; the likes of which there are very few of in the world these days.

And the man doesn’t even know who he is.

“Something wrong?”

He blinks, snapping out of his reverie at the words.

“No, nothing’s wrong. Just reflecting,” Steve tells him.

“Maybe you’d like it if—…” Coulson begins to say, stopping himself short and looking to Steve with wide eyes. “Your wings are gone.”

Steve glances over his shoulder. “So they are. Doing better already, it seems.”

Coulson has both eyebrows raised, but merely nods his head in acknowledgement. Steve has the feeling that the priest knows more than he lets on, but he’s not going to push it. He’d not been pressed for information so he would treat his newfound friend the same. He’s surprised to see a man come sauntering in, one who clearly does not belong there and who looks overly familiar. He rises from his seat, a name on his lips before he can stop himself.

“Howard!?”

But no, this isn’t Howard. He looks so much like him… this must be his son. The one conceived in a union between an angel and a mortal man. A Halfling. Steve hadn’t seen him since, well, since he’d been born. The man seems amused by his mistake.

“So you’re the guy my dad was always on about,” the man says. “Don’t know why he was so impressed.”

“Mr. Stark, please,” Coulson says with a tone that speaks to Steve of a long-suffering relationship.

“Sorry, Phil, you know how he is when he’s set his mind to something,” a woman says, entering the room just behind the man, Stark.

“Unfortunately, yes, I do,” Coulson says lightly. “Steve, meet Tony Stark and Pepper Potts. Mr. Stark, Miss Potts, meet Steve Rogers.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Steve,” Pepper says, holding out a friendly hand.

“The pleasure’s mine, ma’am,” Steve says, smiling as he shakes her hand. She reminds him of Coulson, in a way, exuding that same air of calm.

“Mr. Stark is our… consultant,” Coulson informs him.

“Consultant, God of Technology, Gift to Mankind, and—“

“General annoyance,” Coulson cuts in.

“Only to you, Padre,” Tony croons, a broad grin on his features. “In fact, maybe you should—“

“Phil. We’ve got another one,” Sitwell calls from the open doorway.

Coulson’s demeanor turns on a dime. “How many?”

“We’ve got reports confirming three demonic entities with a possible fourth,” Sitwell returns. “Barton and Romanoff are in the armory now.”

“All right. Let’s get on it. Stark, coming along?” Coulson asks.

“Like you have to ask,” Tony scoffs, rolling his eyes.

“I can help,” Steve says, starting forward.

“No.”

Coulson’s tone has an air of finality and, to his great surprise, Steve stops where he stands. He’s not certain why, but he can’t find it in him to argue with this man.

“You’re not fully recovered. We deal with this kind of thing all the time, so your presence is not required. Remain here with Miss Potts and we’ll be back shortly,” Coulson advises.

Steve finds himself nodding.

“Be careful,” Pepper says, watching the two leave. As soon as they’ve gone, she lays a gentle hand on Steve’s arm. “Well, it looks like Phil’s left you a shirt here. What do you say you put that on and we go get something to eat?”

Knowing that he’s not going to disobey Coulson’s request, he nods with a smile. “I think that would be agreeable, ma’am.”

* * *

It’s three hours before they return, the clock having just struck midnight ten minutes prior. The front door is thrown open and Steve hears a flurry of frantic cries. Along with Pepper, he rises from where he’s sitting, hurrying towards the source of the calamity. He stops short when he sees Coulson and Sitwell carrying another man in as Tony and a red-haired woman hurry close behind. The red-haired woman is carrying, of all things, a bow. A flurry of other exorcists bar the doors shut and it takes an extreme amount of effort to push through the throng of people but he manages, with Pepper in tow, to follow after the smaller group that had hurried off towards the infirmary.

“Get him up on the table,” Sitwell says with a grunt. “Stark, go get Hill. Tell her Barton’s down.”

“Hold still, Barton,” Coulson’s saying, trying to get the man’s leg elevated as Sitwell presses down on his shoulders to keep him flat. “Don’t struggle, you’re making it worse.”

“Easy for you to s— _ah, fuck_!”

Steve shivers at the presence of everyone’s collective grace. He picks out two in particular because they’re familiar. They’re not human. He narrows his eyes, looking between Barton and the woman, who must be Romanoff, and concentrates. It’s hard to do so—whatever had inflicted the grievous wound on Barton’s leg had poisoned him, muddying his grace. But another moment and he’s sure of it. He knows them. He hasn’t seen them since they were fledglings and their grace has been carefully suppressed until tonight, but he’s sure of it.

“Stand aside,” he says, stepping forward without hesitation.

This time, it’s Coulson who obeys without a word. Without preamble, Steve lays a hand on the wound to Barton’s leg, closes his eyes and focuses. It’s difficult when he’s not completely recovered, but Barton’s own grace aids the process. He feels flesh knit beneath his palm, bone and muscle and sinew healing, drawing out the dark poison threatening Barton’s grace. Eventually he takes his hand away, using it instead to steady himself against the table. His wings are out again, drooping limply to the floor after the cost of using so much of his grace makes it too difficult to will them away and the room spins.

“Easy. Easy now, there’s a chair right here, right behind you,” Coulson is murmuring, and there are those sure hands again, guiding him to a seat.

He slumps down gratefully, thoroughly worn from even that small effort. They’re talking around him still, but he’s far too exhausted to follow what they say. He gathers that Barton is alright and that he’s going to have to have a very long talk with all of them very soon. But before that happens, there’s a hand on his shoulder, urging him to rise.

“Come on, now, you can’t sleep there. Your back won’t be thanking you in the morning if you do,” Coulson tells him. “Just lean on me and we’ll get you to bed.”

Steve manages to get up with the help of a few sets of hands, but the room is spinning too badly for him to be able to tell who they belong to. Eventually, however, only he and Coulson remain, and he somehow manages to keep placing one foot in front of the other long enough to get to a bed. He doesn’t so much sit as he collapses, the effort to keep himself upright with his eyes open rapidly becoming too difficult a task. He huffs a breathy sigh as he lies on his stomach and feels a blanket being tugged over him, while still being mindful of his wings.

He doesn’t hear any footsteps, he never does with Coulson, but he feels the man’s grace moving away from him.

“Father?” he asks, his head shooting up so quickly that he has to squeeze his eyes shut again almost immediately.

Coulson pauses. “Yes?”

“…would you stay?”

There’s only a beat of hesitation before Coulson answers him. “Of course.”

He hears the scrape of a chair being pulled forward and breathes a sigh of relief when he senses the man settle beside him. Perhaps it wouldn’t make sense to priest if he were to explain his request; that he feels closest to home when Father Coulson is nearby. But right then, it hardly matters. He drifts off to sleep, content in the knowledge that the priest will remain by his side.

Although, he hadn’t expected the man to stay the whole night and is surprised to see the priest fast asleep in the chair beside his bed come morning, dry blood still smeared across his cheek. This leads to Steve fussing and fretting and Coulson just seeming frustrated that he’d fallen asleep at his post. Steve’s not quite sure what to make of that.

* * *

Their numbers grow steadily over the course of the next few weeks. Even past the point of his recovery, Steve remains. He can feel that something is coming. Demonic activity has been on the rise since he’d plummeted to earth and still the snow falls.

Everyone already seems aware of Clint and Natasha’s angelic status. Clint uses the term ‘sleeper agents’ which isn’t exactly wrong—they were remarkably young as far as angels went and weren’t even exactly angels outright. More-so than Tony, but less-so than Steve, they were two of a handful that had been brought into being and placed on earth in their infancy, raised among mortals, perhaps believing themselves to be mortals also, for a time. They’d been working with Coulson and the others for quite a few years, Steve gathers.

Then there is Bruce Banner. Steve knows Bruce, though Bruce does not know him. He knows the story of an abusive father who, quite literally, threw his son to the wolves only to have that son survive, emerging as one of the very creatures that had been meant to end his life. Full moons brought upon painful transformations into a behemoth of a wolf, bigger than a Clydesdale. His father had exploited that, entering him into underground fights for other weres, rather like a cockfighting ring. Years of abuse continued until Bruce had graduated from university and discovered he could transform outside the scope of the full moon in the most violent way possible—there hadn’t been much left of the man who had been a father in title only. The affair had been handled quietly, by an organization much like the one Coulson belonged to, and Bruce had been pardoned, given his history, but the damage was done. No one could look at him as anything other than a weak cage for the monster inside him. That was, until he’d managed to find his way to them. Tony has taken a particular shine to their Dr. Banner, which Steve simply can’t find any objection to.

Tony himself is something of an oddity. You can tell at first glance—it’s hard to miss the glowing circle in the middle of his chest. After Howard and his mother had died, Tony had been left to run his father’s company himself. A genius beyond his father, and a Halfling at that, it was no wonder he’d been kidnapped just a few short years prior. Steve finds it painful to imagine what it must have been like when his captors had tried to essentially rip his grace out through his chest. Their botched attempt had left it exposed, like a nerve—damaged. The glowing circle, something of Tony’s own design, was meant to both artificially enhance and protect his grace. Artificially manufactured grace. Steve isn’t sure how he feels about it. Tony calls it a new element, but it still doesn’t sit quite well with him. It powers that metal suit of his, in any case, so he supposes so long as it stays with Tony then there’s no harm in it.

They learn of the cause behind all the mayhem on the mortal plane from Thor. Most of them seemed surprised to find that the God of Thunder was, in fact, an angel. He simply happens to be from another garrison than Steve. The cause of the trouble is Loki. The silvertongued angel had been responsible for the ambush that had resulted in Steve’s injuries just as he was responsible for the snow and the demonic activity. Loki had turned, Thor reported grimly, and was somewhere on earth.

With a target to pursue at last, the hunt was on.

* * *

Their searching is tireless as they fight back waves of demonic activity, but it sometimes feels as though they haven’t come any closer.

It comes to a head one day when Thor and Coulson venture out into the snow and do not return.

It had been such a seemingly simple mission, but when the second hour had passed, they knew something was wrong. And so they searched. It’s just as Steve is beginning to wonder if they’ll ever find them that he feels something. It’s a whisper of what it should be, Thor’s mighty anger cut down to a mere sliver, but he grabs hold and follows it, leading their entire group to the basement of a building he’s sure is hundreds of years old.

He spots Thor first, trapped in a ring of devil’s fire, his wings drooping dangerously even as he pants and puffs and roars, his lightning cut down to mere static. But Thor doesn’t have eyes for them. Steve is almost afraid to turn his head and swallows a shout when he finds what is tormenting Thor in his fiery prison.

It’s Father Coulson.

Steve surges forward, his head feeling like it’s stuffed with cotton. The priest is propped up against one of the support beams, his wrists tied above his head so that the toes of his shoes barely scrape the ground. The man’s head is bowed and there is blood. He can’t see it through the priest’s dark garments, but he can smell it. Bruce is beside him suddenly, providing calm where Steve no longer can.

“Get him down, help me get him down, Bruce,” Steve blurts, already reaching up to untie the man’s wrists.

His stomach lurches when he discovers what Coulson’s wrists had been bound with: his own stole. There’s something cruel and mocking in that, something that makes his heart clench and his gut squirm. Bruce finishes with the last of the knots and Coulson sags forward into Steve’s waiting arms. The man is limp and Steve’s hands come away sticky with blood as he lowers the priest to the ground.

“Steve?” Bruce tries cautiously.

The wound runs straight through from back to front, not directly piercing his heart, no, that would be too quick. Much too quick for Loki’s tastes. Coulson’s still warm.

“Steve. He’s gone,” Bruce says, laying a hand on his shoulder.

Cradling the priest gently, Steve might have believed the man was only sleeping were it not for the smear of blood at the corner of his mouth. He can’t wrap his mind around it, why one more mortal’s death should cripple him like this, how Loki knew it would. Already he finds himself aching in the absence of Coulson’s grace. From his peripheral vision he can see that Thor has been freed and the look of anguish on the Thunder God’s face matches what he feels inside. There was nothing Thor could have done, not trapped as he’d been. They all hang back a few feet, standing in a strange semi-circle. Tony looks like he’s about to be sick.

“He doesn’t have to be,” Steve says quietly.

“What?” Bruce says with a frown.

Thor’s grace is not adapted to healing, but Steve’s is.

“He doesn’t have to be gone,” Steve answers.

“To attempt such a thing…” Thor says, trailing off. He looks exhausted. “Surely you will perish in his place, if not along with him.”

“It’s a better fate than doing nothing at all,” Steve answers.

“Hey, hey, wait a minute here, you’re not saying you can—?” Clint says.

But Steve’s already gone.

* * *

It’s a small miracle that Steve survives and even more of a miracle that he recovers enough to take part in their group’s rallied effort against Loki. Thor has since taken the God of Mischief back home, but Steve has remained behind. He’s not done with his time on the mortal plane just yet.

The snow has melted and life has returned to something approaching normal, but Father Coulson has yet to wake. It’s hardly any wonder, Steve thinks, considering what he’s been through.

He shifts in his seat, which he’s hardly left since Loki’s defeat, and leans forward, placing his hand over the priest’s heart. Bringing him back to life had been about the only thing Steve had been able to do; hanging on to life, healing, that had been left up to Coulson. Steve had drained himself in the battle and any further attempts at healing had done nothing but leave him frustrated and light headed. He’s beginning to wonder if the man in the bed will ever wake up when he gets a sign; it’s not much, a mere fluttering of the eyes, but it’s more than enough.

Steve waits patiently, watching as the priest fights his way back to consciousness until at last his eyes are open and his bleary gaze find’s Steve’s face.

“…Michael…”

Steve freezes, the smile dropping from his face. Coulson knows his name. His true name.

“You knew,” he says.

Coulson gives him the barest of nods. Steve shakes his head with a soft huff of laughter. He wonders how he is so transparent to this man, how Coulson has seen right through him. It makes him wonder how many other things the man has seen. Without hesitation he reaches out, resting his hand on the priest’s forehead. Coulson’s eyes slide shut again and Steve hums.

“Still fevered,” he says.

Coulson’s eyes are on him again.

“Is Loki…?”

“Taken care of, through no small miracle,” Steve answers. “Thor’s taken him home to receive whatever punishment is seen fit to match his crimes.”

There’s another question in the priest’s eyes, and Steve answers it readily, sparing him the trouble of finding the breath to ask it.

“Everyone’s safe or recovering. There were a few casualties, as there usually are with such things, but they were given proper burials and their souls have made the safe journey home,” Steve says slowly. “None of your closest people were among them, and of them, your injuries are the most severe.”

He can see the tension leaving the priest at that news, and hears a slow, gratified sigh to match.  It’s seemed to put him more at ease. For a moment he watches the steady rise and fall of the mortal man’s chest, wondering why the preservation of the flesh housing his grace is of such great importance to him.

“You’re… still here,” Coulson says in a wheeze.

His eyes are open, tired but regarding Steve with intense curiosity. Steve nods.

“I’m still here,” he agrees. “I couldn’t leave until I was sure you were going to wake.”

“’m’wake now,” Coulson murmurs.

Steve can’t help but grin. “Yeah, you are. But you didn’t leave me as soon as I’d woken, so I’m not going to do that to you.”

“You have to… be homesick,” Coulson says.

“In the beginning I was. I suppose I might still be a little now,” Steve admits. He rubs the back of his neck. “But I’m in no hurry. What’s that saying…? ‘Heaven can wait.’ It was a song, I think.”

There’s amusement in the lopsided smile on the priest’s lips and when he drifts off shortly after, his sleep looking far more restful than it had been previously. Steve is left alone with his thoughts once more. He could go home now, he supposes, and there is still that part of him which wishes to go… but it’s drowned out by the need to stay where he is.

Reaching out once again, he deliberately lays a hand on the man’s chest and concentrates. He can still feel the damage that cuts all the way through; skin, bone, muscle, heart… straight down to his grace. Coulson is healing, but he will never fully recover, Steve knows. Not to how he had been before this. His grace will bear the scars of this encounter just as his body will, for the rest of his life. Yet even with those scars, he finds the priest’s grace to be as magnetic as the first time he’d felt it—perhaps even more so.

He knows where he wants to be.

* * *

“Father Coulson, I was wondering if we could have a discussion, if you’re not busy?”

Steve is standing in the doorway of the office, his hands clasped behind his back. He watches the priest look up from his desk with a smile and wave him in. Coulson’s convalescence has gone well in the past few months, though is still not fully recovered. He carries himself with great care, his left arm moving stiffly, and often Steve thinks he pushes himself too hard too soon, but he’s getting better and he supposes that’s the important part.

“For you, I have all the time in the world,” Coulson replies, removing and folding up his horn rimmed reading glasses as Steve takes a seat. “What’s on your mind?”

“I wanted to talk to you about going home,” Steve says.

He knows it’s uncharitable of him to feel some pleasure at the slight flicker of disappointment in the priest’s eyes, but he feels it all the same. But Coulson masks that emotion splendidly, offering what anyone else might perceive to be an enthusiastic smile.

“I’m sure you’ve been eager to get back,” he says. “And now that I’m on the mend you don’t have to feel obligated to stay any longer.”

“I never felt obligated,” Steve says with a frown.

“Oh, I never meant to imply that you did,” Coulson recovers quickly. “I merely meant that there’s nothing keeping you here any longer.”

“That’s not quite true,” Steve corrects him.

“No?” Coulson says, arching a brow curiously.

“I’ve been doing some thinking. A lot of thinking. And praying. But apparently this is the one of those areas in which I will be offered no guidance,” Steve admits.

“Not a pleasant feeling, is it?” Coulson asks with a patient tone.

“No, it isn’t. I can see why mortals get so frustrated,” Steve admits. “But I’m getting off topic. Like I said, I’ve been doing some thinking, and that’s lead to me to conclude… that I’d like to stay here.”

Coulson frowns, confusion evident on his face. “You don’t want to go back?”

“I do want to go back. I just want to stay here more,” Steve elaborates. “I’d like to stay, if you’ll have me.”

“Of course you’re welcome as long as you’d like, and we’d be glad to have you, but why the change of heart? I thought you were eager to get home once the business with Loki had been concluded?” Coulson queries.

“I think change of heart is the best way you could have put it,” Steve says slowly. “You know of Tony Stark’s parentage.”

Coulson nods. “Yes. His mother was an angel who gave up her wings to be with his father, Howard Stark.”

“It’s not an entirely uncommon occurrence,” Steve says, rising from his seat. “Although, that was the most recent case.”

“And you find yourself in a similar position,” Coulson deduces.

“Yes,” Steve says. He pauses before he steps closer to the priest’s seat, leaning forward and resting his hands on the armrests. “Would you have me?”

He sees the surprise, the sudden glimmer of hope in the man’s startled expression. Coulson doesn’t move, just stares like he’s never quite seen anything like Steve in his life.

“I’d like to kiss you,” Steve says quietly. “May I?”

Coulson nods, just barely, giving Steve his permission. His lips are warm, receptive, if slightly chapped, and Steve takes the time to enjoy the pleasant tingle in his chest as he feels the priest’s grace shine all the more brightly in response to his own. Coulson’s hands slide up his arms, to his shoulders… and then he’s being pushed away.

“No, no, we can’t,” Coulson says, turning his face away.

“You know that your Bible’s gotten it all wrong, right? He doesn’t care if it’s a man and a woman, or two men, or two women, or even three or—“

“No, that’s… well, that’s good to know, but it’s not what I meant,” Coulson responds, still not looking at him.

Steve moves to kneel at his feet, his hands resting on the priest’s knees. “You don’t feel the same way.”

“I do. That’s that problem,” Coulson sighs.

“I don’t understand,” Steve says with a frown.

Coulson looks at him then, and it’s plain to see he’s going to say something that he doesn’t want to, but feels he has to.

“Steve,” he begins.

He pauses, apparently losing his will to continue. The priest shakes his head, rallying himself, and lays a hand atop Steve’s head, running his fingers through golden blonde hair.

“Michael,” he tries again, and that gets Steve’s attention. Coulson has only called him by name the once. “I can’t let you give up your wings for me. I can’t let you be Steve Rogers when so many people need you as Michael. I can’t be that selfish, to keep you for myself.”

“There are other angels, other archangels—“

“But they’re not you,” Coulson says earnestly. “No one can replace you, no one’s fit to.”

Steve sighs heavily, knowing the truth of the words, and bows his head until his forehead rests atop his hands.

“Besides which, giving up your wings is not the same as losing your immortality,” Coulson continues. “I’m a mortal man. I’m going to get old and I’m going to die. You’ll still be here, forced to stay here until… well, until it all ends.”

“In other words, you’re asking me to be patient,” Steve interprets.

“In a way, yes,” Coulson responds. “Do you understand?”

“Yes. Of course,” Steve says. He tilts his head up. “I can wait. For you, I can do that.”

Coulson nods, looking both infinitely pleased and subdued by the decision. Steve rises up enough to kiss him again, knowing that it will be a very long time between this one and the next. Moving between heaven and earth is difficult, stressful even for an archangel, but he’ll do whatever it takes. For now, however… he knows he has to go home. He breaks the kiss, resting his forehead against the priest’s.

“I’ll come back for you,” he says quietly.

“I know you will,” is the response.

Quite suddenly, Coulson is alone in his study once again. There is no evidence that Steve had been there just a moment ago, aside from the lingering tingle on his lips. Squaring his shoulders, he retrieves his reading glasses and returns to the papers before him.

* * *

It snows whenever Steve visits, which, more often than not, happens to be on the Fourth of July.

His first visit is a year later. He stays for only a week before he’s gone again.

The next visit is two years later. He stays for three weeks.

It’s another five years before Steve comes back.

He spots Coulson preparing for bed when he swoops in. The priest turns, a surprised and overjoyed grin making its way to his face as Steve effectively tackles him to the bed. There’s a frantic air to the way they disrobe, hurriedly and with little care towards preserving buttons, before Steve is pressing him to the bed, pressing into him, bringing him to take the Lord’s name in vain more than once in the next two hours.

Afterward, as they lie in a tangle of sheets and limbs, quite happy to linger in that blissful, post-orgasmic haze, Coulson presses lazy kisses to his neck.

“How long are you here this time?” he asks, his words muffled slightly as he speaks against Steve’s skin.

“Six months,” Steve says, fighting to contain his grin.

Coulson looks up disbelievingly.

“Apparently I earned a little time off,” Steve says, tracing his partner’s flank. “Does six months work for you, Phil?”

“Six months works for me,” Coulson says before Steve’s being kissed senseless again.

Even then, six months goes by too quickly, the merest blink of an eye in the scope of time.

* * *

Coulson looks older each time Steve visits. He wrinkles and grays at the temples and stoops more and wears his glasses more often. Steve always laughs whenever the priests makes an apology for their sex life not being quite as lively as it was in the beginning.

“That’s not what I come here for,” Steve says, kissing his hands.

“Still,” Coulson says. “It’s not exactly thrilling being with an old man.”

“Please,” Steve snorts. “I’m ancient, next to you.”

Coulson doesn’t answer that, just runs his hand through Steve’s hair, just the way he knows the angel loves.

* * *

Coulson gets older. What’s left of his hair goes completely gray, his steps reduced to slow shuffles, his eyesight nearly gone. His hands are gnarled with arthritis and shake when he writes. Still, Steve loves him. Loves him just as much as he did in the beginning, if not more.

Steve doesn’t mind when the old priest falls asleep as they sit in the yard on the swing, a blanket across their knees.

It will be the last time they sit like this.

* * *

Coulson looks so frail when Steve visits again. He’s gone blind, but still, somehow, he knows when Steve is there, despite the angel not making a single sound. He kneels by the priest’s bedside, taking one of the man’s pale, bony hands in his.

The people gathered by the bed don’t see him, but then, they wouldn’t for this.

“Michael…?”

Steve grins at the use of his true name.

“How long… are you here?”

Steve shakes his head.

“Not long,” he says softly.

Coulson nods. Steve waits. He waits and counts each labored breath, watches as pain eases into sleep, before he squeezes Coulson’s hand and whispers to him gently.

“It’s time to go home, Phil.”

* * *

It’s white around them. He looks to the man beside him, the one whose hand he holds tightly in his own. He looks as he did when Steve had first laid eyes on him, his blue-gray eyes scanning the expanse of white curiously. He looks down at himself and seems surprised to find he’s also shrouded in white. He looks up at Steve.

“You came back,” he says simply.

“You knew I would,” Steve answers.

Coulson smiles at him, squeezes his hand back.

“Are you ready?” Steve asks him.

“I’m ready,” Coulson answers. “Let’s go home.”


End file.
